THE HORMONE OF PREPARATION 



to treat their patients as laboratory subjects, which means 

 more attention, more examination and more testing than 

 patients with better-understood diseases usually require, and 

 more expense for somebody, either the patient herself or the 

 research budget of a clinic. The pages of medical journals 

 are, however, nowadays full of reports of research, and day 

 by day the subject is being advanced. 



There is one disorder of health in which it is perfectly 

 clear that the trouble is caused by the ovary failing to put 

 out enough hormone and that a supply from the drug store 

 will be helpful. This is the distress that often follows the 

 cessation of the menstrual cycle, both the natural menopause 

 of women at 45 or 50 years of age, and the so-called "surgical 

 menopause" produced by operative removal of the ovaries. 

 When the characteristic symptoms of a stormy menopause, 

 such as hot flushes of the skin and general nervousness, be- 

 come almost intolerable, large doses of estrogenic hormones 

 often give genuine relief. 



Another helpful use of estrogenic hormones is in the treat- 

 ment of retarded sex development caused by ovarian in- 

 sufficiency. In certain cases, selected by experienced physi- 

 cians as likely to be helped, and carefully treated over long 

 periods, the aspects of femininity have been given to under- 

 developed girls, with great benefit to their social adjustment 

 and their morale. 



These hormones are powerful agents. We have seen that 

 they affect many organs, and even yet we do not know all 

 they may be doing in the body. In careful experienced medical 

 hands they can be beneficent drugs. Used recklessly they 

 may do great damage. 



The estrogenic hormones and cancer. There is a whole 

 series of chemical substances that cause cancer or other 

 tumors, malignant and benign, when injected or rubbed 

 into the skin. Some of these are chemically similar to the 

 estrogenic hormones and indeed there are a few synthetic 



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